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weeks, memorizing every beat to every song. The goal was to have it look fun
and light, but behind it, as always, was work and a larger purpose—to keep
connecting people with the issue. My segment with James had forty-five million
views on YouTube within the first three months, making every bit of the effort
worth it.

oward the end of 2015, Barack, the girls, and I flew to Hawaii to spend
Christmas as we always did, renting a big house with wide windows that looked
out on the beach, joined by our usual group of family friends. As we had for the
last six years, we took time on Christmas Day to visit with service members and
their families at a nearby Marine Corps base. And as it had been right through,
for Barack the vacation was only a partial vacation—a just-barely vacation, really.
He fielded phone calls, sat for daily briefings, and was consulting with a skeleton
staff of advisers, aides, and speechwriters who were all staying at a hotel close by.
It made me wonder whether he’d remember how to fully relax when the time
actually came, whether either one of us would find a way to let down when this
was all over. What would it feel like, I wondered, when we finally got to go
somewhere without the guy carrying the nuclear football?

Though I was allowing myself to dream a little, I still couldn’t picture how
any of this would end.

Returning to Washington to begin our final year in the White House, we
knew the clock was ticking now in earnest. I began what would become a long
series of “lasts.” There was the last Governors’ Ball, the last Easter Egg Roll, the
last White House Correspondents’ Dinner. Barack and I also made a last state visit
to the United Kingdom together, which included a quick trip to see our friend
the Queen.

Barack had always felt a special fondness for Queen Elizabeth, saying that she
reminded him of his no-nonsense grandmother, Toot. I personally was awed by
her efficiency, a skill clearly forged by necessity over a lifetime in the public eye.
One day a few years earlier, Barack and I had stood, hosting a receiving line
together with her and Prince Philip. I’d watched, bemused, as the Queen
managed to whisk people speedily past with economic, friendly hellos that left no
room for follow-up conversation, while Barack projected an amiable looseness,
almost inviting chitchat and then ponderously answering people’s questions,
thereby messing up the flow of the line. All these years after meeting the guy, I